What Is 'Open'? Openwashing and the Half-Truths About Openness | eLearningInside News

ab1630's bookmarks 2018-01-02

Summary:

"Throughout the industry of education technology, sales teams and marketing arms have sought to wow administrators and close deals with a single word: open....The term openwashing, as defined by Audrey Watters, is “having an appearance of open-source and open-licensing for marketing purposes, while continuing proprietary practices.” Others, however, believe that openwashing refers only to open-source code....Regardless of whether it is software or educational content, one man’s ‘open’ is another man’s ‘closed.’ Does the product or service subscribe to a freemium model? Does the company reserve the right to change its policies at any time to jack up the cost? Can you download it? Share it? These two questions might just help to clear up questions that remain from some of the sneakier marketing campaigns. If a company is willing to openwash to sell their product, they might just fall short in other departments as well. But many truly open-source companies (and even open-er than open-source) are doing amazing work and deserve your support."

Link:

https://news.elearninginside.com/open-openwashing-half-truths-openness/

From feeds:

Open Access Tracking Project (OATP) » ab1630's bookmarks

Tags:

oa.new oa.terminology oa.misunderstandings oa.negative oa.principles oa.oer oa.definitions oa.openwashing

Date tagged:

01/02/2018, 09:59

Date published:

01/02/2018, 04:59